Open Veins of Latin America

Section 1 Summary: “As Lungs Need Air, So the U.S. Economy Needs Latin American Minerals”

The US has a vested interest in Latin America for its mineral resources such as petroleum, aluminum, copper, and zinc. These materials are used to fortify US military weapons, design planes, and fuel jet engines. While the US has tried to extract these materials domestically, these resources are not as plentiful within the country as it is abroad. Galeano declares that this means that the US will always seek natural resources elsewhere for its own advancement. He further states, “The internal stability of the world’s greatest power is closely linked with its investments south of the Río Grande” (152).

Section 2 Summary: “By-Products of the Subsoil: Coups d’état, Revolutions, Spy Dramas, Etc.”

For Galeano, there is a link between US intervention in Latin American politics and access to its countries’ resources. For instance, US mining company Bethlehem Steel was able to continue mining manganese in Brazil for four percent of the income of exporting it during the country’s transition to dictatorship. In Venezuela, the pattern of coup d’états seemed to occur after each oil concession. When Cuba nationalized the Nicaro Nickel Company, the US threatened an embargo on French mental exports if France did not stop buying nickel from Cuba. In these instances, the US benefitted from political control of Latin American governments to determine the terms of the market.

Galeano argues that the US depends on natural resources from elsewhere in the world “to maintain its ability to wage war” (154). Mineral exports went into making jet planes and other military defense technology. The US had gone to such lengths as investing in surveillance activities as using electromagnetic devices for photographing Brazil’s Amazon forests to detect the presence of minerals in the 1960s. This suspicious activity alluded to the US’s design to make the Amazon its “new frontier” (155). Furthermore, this surveillance activity seemed to coincide with the forced sterilization of Brazilian women residing in these forest areas, presumably an attempt to control population growth so that people would not interfere with access to minerals.

Section 3 Summary: “A German Chemist Defeats the Winners of the War of the Pacific”

After 1840, guano and nitrate from Peru became one of its greatest exports as they were the most advanced sources for fertilizers for the British at that point in history. The success of these exports drove Chile, Peru, and Bolivia to war over control of these mineral deposits. The War of the Pacific, which began in 1879 and ended in 1883, saw Chile’s victory. As the victor, Chile managed Peru’s production of guano and nitrate, benefitting from the profits of the trade. Soon, the British had an established trade relationship with Chile to mine Peru for its guano and nitrate.

Between 1886 and 1890, Chilean President José Manuel Balmaceda declared the nationalization of Chilean nitrate and refused to sell state-owned nitrate fields to the British. British nitrate mogul John Thomas North and others financed the rebellion against Balmaceda during the country’s civil war, ultimately removing him from power.

Leading up to World War I, nitrate made up of two-thirds of Chile’s national income as “an appendage of the British economy” (160). However, this would change drastically when a German chemist discovered how to fix nitrogen from the air to create nitrate years later. While Chile had once profited from trade of nitrate, the invention of an alternative method of retrieving nitrate reduced the reliance on Chile for its export of this material.

Galeano reflects on his visits to the mining villages where nitrate excavation once took place. These villages have become ghost towns. The residents told him, “Here money flowed and everyone thought it would never stop” (161).

Section 4 Summary: “Copper Teeth in Chile’s Flesh”

Chile feared repeating the impact that the decrease in nitrate exports had on its economy. In 1970, Chilean President Salvador Allende nationalized copper, which was not a favorable move for the US. Preoccupied by political activities in Southeast Asia, the US could not intervene in Chile’s nationalization of copper using the same means of pressure that it had utilized in the past. Chile’s resources have found other markets, and the demand for copper was constant regardless of price fluctuation. The US needed Chilean copper.

This nationalization trend began to spread to other countries that frequently mined and exported copper. Chile, Zambia, the Congo, and Peru had discussed forming a common price-defense policy to establish a united front against global pressures to allow Western control of copper. Galeano believes that the “the international copper market is crumbling dangerously” (164) as nationalization efforts are returning control of copper back to the country from which the resource came.

Section 5 Summary: “The Miners, Under and Above Ground”

While nationalization of natural resources returns some control of exports to the country of origin, Galeano states that the country can still be “condemned to impotency as ever” (166). This is due to the insistent demand for these resources in the world market, which forces an unequal division of labor and unhealthy working conditions for the poorest workers.

Galeano offers Bolivia as an example of how the US demand for tin only exacerbated terrible mining conditions for the country’s poor laborers. Despite the nationalization of tin following the 1952 revolution, tin miners suffered low wages and abominable working conditions. Miners slept with family members in cramped spaces, suffered congestion of dust and ash that led to chronic health issues and eventual death. Galeano states, “Bolivians die with rotted lungs so that the world may consume cheap tin” (167). Meanwhile, owners and managers of tin companies earn much greater salaries than the miners and were exempt from health defects resulting from the mining process.

Section 6 Summary: “Iron Teeth in Brazil’s Flesh”

Galeano opens this section by declaring that the US pays less for Brazilian and Venezuelan iron than the iron from its own subsoil. Due to the prominence of the US steel industry, which relies on iron for steel products, the US has a definitive stake in the political development of both Latin American countries. The US has always wielded power in ensuring that iron prices are favorable to its steel companies. This was especially true for Brazil, which entered into a military pact with the US in 1952 to not sell iron or any raw materials with strategic value to any socialist country. Brazil broke this pact by selling to Poland and Czechoslovakia in 1953 and 1954 with higher prices than issued to the US. Nevertheless, this proved a threat to US steel businesses.

In 1961, Brazilian President Jânio Quadros signed a bill that would restore Minas Gerais iron to the national reserve, preventing US Hanna Mining company from exploiting the territory for iron. Eventually, armed forces removed Quadros from presidency, presumably for his attempts to nationalize iron. Brazil’s Vice President João Goulart took his place but would eventually be removed from power as well when he hesitated to undo Quadros’ bill. The US did not hesitate to celebrate Goulart’s removal from power and the government that replaced him, which would favor US dealings with iron. The US ambassador to Brazil, Lincoln Gordon stated that Goulart’s dismissal was “one of the most important moments of change in mid-twentieth century world history” (173) comparable to the defeat of communism in Korea and resolving the missile crisis in Cuba. Finally, the US sponsored the Humberto de Alencar Castelo Branco military dictatorship who operated on a staunch anti-communist political stance. In 1965, Castelo Branco permitted US Bethlehem Steel and Hanna Mining to strike an agreement for joint access to Brazilian iron deposits.

Section 7 Summary: “The Black Curse of Petroleum”

Galeano discusses the monopoly over petroleum that had come to dictate the political development of Latin American countries. As a natural resource, people considered petroleum a “black gold” where “no jewel in the diadem of capitalism is so monopolized” (175). According to his estimation, the ratio of profits experienced by the US and European countries purchasing petroleum to the Latin American countries producing it are 11 to one. The decent wages of US and European petroleum companies versus the low wages of laborers in Latin American production of petroleum were emblematic of that divide.

Galeano describes the monopolization of petroleum by US and British oil companies as a “cartel” (176). In 1928, Standard Oil, Shell, and Anglo-Iranian (now British Petroleum) came to an agreement about how to divide up Latin American and Middle Eastern territories for petroleum extraction. Their agreement did not consider the livelihoods of those living in the Latin American countries where they extracted petroleum.

There were a few cases of Latin American countries that opposed this monopoly successfully, one of which was Cuba. During the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro opposed US enforcement of high prices to refine petroleum in Cuba, inciting the US to cut the Cuban sugar quota to threaten its economy. In response, Castro traded sugar for petroleum with the USSR at prices that were beneficial to Cuba. As Standard Oil refused to refine petroleum from a socialist country, Cuba decided to nationalize petroleum, which led the US to forge an embargo against Cuba. Cuba’s refusal to bend to the US oil companies’ trading terms and strategic relations with other socialist countries for trade enabled them to circumvent the pressures other countries experienced from this monopoly.

However, not all Latin American countries were able to oppose the monopoly successfully. In 1932, Uruguay formed the state-owned petroleum refinery, ANCAP. ANCAP still received pressure by US and British multinational oil companies, however. These companies sought an agreement that would require purchase of crude petroleum at the price they dictated, while also requiring ANCAP to absorb the corporations’ miscellaneous operational costs. Galeano further argues that “The U.S. government always makes common cause with private oil companies” (183). This suggests that US loyalties would always lie with private interests, especially where petroleum was concerned.

Section 8 Summary: “Vultures Over Lake Maracaibo”

In this section, Galeano focuses on the detrimental social and economic impacts of petroleum production in Venezuela, which had become the world’s top petroleum exporter. Venezuela produces 3.5 million barrels of petroleum everyday but only uses half of this amount domestically. The multinational oil corporations divide up the rest and set their own prices, often at Venezuela’s disadvantage. When oil extraction costs dipped between 1959 to 1962, oil companies used less labor, causing massive unemployment in Venezuela.

The conditions of unemployment characterized the depraved circumstances of Lake Maracaibo in Venezuela where petroleum was once abundant. The US oil companies benefitted from Venezuelan dictator-run governments that cooperated with them to set up oil wells throughout the country, setting up a great wealth disparity that relied on US made products. Lake Maracaibo was an example of how excessive drilling led to depletion of the land and hardships for those who once found jobs on these sites. Once the wells dried up, the jobs disappeared. The writer Salvador Garmendia wrote to Galeano that in Lake Maracaibo, “The smell of death and decay overpowers the smell of oil” (189).